How Big Oil Made It Harder to Fight the Los Angeles Fires
Fossil fuel companies are profiting off a state tax break depriving California of up to $146 million of annual tax revenue that could be used to combat climate-change-fueled wildfires — like the inferno currently tearing through Los Angeles.
The Los Angeles Fires Didn’t Have to Be This Bad
From budgetary neglect to climate inaction to private monopolies, political choices have fanned the flames of California’s devastating fires.
Politicians quibbling as LA burns: Gavin Newsom’s latest beef with Trump
Gavin Newsom, California’s Democratic governor, appeared briefly to put his long-running feud with Donald Trump to one side on Friday, when he invited the president-elect to Los Angeles to survey devastation from the wildfires and meet with first responders, firefighters and the “Americans” affected.
“In the spirit of this great country, we must not politicize human tragedy or spread disinformation from the sidelines,” Newsom wrote in a letter to Trump on Friday. “Hundreds of thousands of Americans – displaced from their homes and fearful for the future – deserve to see all of us working in their best interests to ensure a fast recovery and rebuild.”
The detente lasted less than 24 hours. By Saturday, Newsom, who is in contention to become the Democratic party leader in time for 2028, had returned to a more familiar, oppositional stance.
In an interview with Pod Save America, he rejected Trump’s claim that water is being withheld from southern California to save an endangered fish, the delta smelt, calling the president-elect’s messaging on the issue “delusional” and part of a “consistent mantra from Trump going back years and years, and it’s reinforced over and over within the right wing … and it’s profoundly ignorant”.
The Right MUST blame the unprecedented LA Fires on Democratic incompetence rather than climate change because it is essential for the narrative construct of neoliberal capitalism that climate change is a socialist hoax.
The truth is the underfunded fire service that has survived a thousand cuts could not in away way have really stopped what happened because what happened is climate change!
We have warned and warned and warned people this was the consequence of dangerously super heating the planet for the Polluter Industries.
Raise the planet by more than 1.5 degrees in temperature and the EXACT scenes playing out in LA becomes the norm.
It normally takes hundreds of thousands of years to build up to the Carbon levels we now have in the atmosphere, the only difference is we have done it in 3 centuries.
We are utterly off the rails and in uncharted territory.
With a more than 50% chance the AMOC will shut down before 2050, we are in an environmental doom loop.
This is why the Right have to blame Democratic incompetence rather than their own Toal acquiescence to the Polluter Industries.
We are in the age on consequences and we need to know who to blame.
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I don’t know the ins and outs of the politics involved, nor the relationship of climate change to these particular fires.
One thing I do know for sure is that I will be paying for them. I saw an estimate of $460b in damage. I am damn sure that the insurance companies are not going to take that on the chin and say “well I guess no profits for us for a few years”. Even my little 60 year old Keith Hay box here in New Plymouth will get an extra squeeze for a few more drops of premiums.
Meme doing the rounds…
“You might not believe Climate Change is real-but the Insurance industry does”
Automatic blame, one way or the other just fans the flames…..what does the LA fire department have to say….
Covid lock down showed the World what the outcome financially would be if areas of the economy was stopped like tourism. I am not a denier but I am a realist. Simply stopping actively is not the solution.
Technology should be the pursuit not glue.
The climate didn’t get the memo:
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/538890/cold-day-streak-the-worst-start-to-wellington-s-summer-in-a-decade
only a fool takes a knife to a gun fight
There was serious under funding of the LA County fire service.
The Palisades fire may have been the result of not having staff to watch over a New Years fireworks fire once strong winds turned up to reignite it.
They also need building covenants to reduce fire risk and a neighbourhood volunteer system (to put out small fires fast) to operate in hire fire risk periods, when the planes and helicopters cannot operate*** because of Santa Ana winds.
Also design a ground based (and drone) military scale water defence system to stand by*** (land area and also in the hills) – the cost would be a lot less than the insurance payouts.
Send that over to them SPC – it is probably in the 1% of useful communications they have received and would give that percentage a better press than usual. Here is for the Practical and Kind 1 Percenters (PK1s)!! They may be all that is left in the world by year 2099.
Seen on CNN: Google search for “Climate Change” down 9%, for “Wildfire” up by 2,400%.
California firies no water but increasing gender fluid.
Just wait till the insurance companies sue the mayor of LA,the fire chief and Newson for the cost of their incompetence.
They are already looking at councils in NZ to cover claims for incompetence in civil disasters!
Just wait till the insurance companies sue the mayor of LA,the fire chief and Newson for the cost of their incompetence.
They are already looking at councils in NZ to cover claims for incompetence in civil disasters!
The thing about LA fires is that it was a predicted event pending on the right conditions, which occured this time. How does a fire department get defunded when the risk was so high and how come there seems to a general lack of community awareness or the very real risk….this has happened recently before too so does seem real dumb. For example in Edo Japan they had a bunch of neighborhood guys wandering the streets banging sticks warning the community to be vigilant against fires, every night. So they were hyper vigilant about fire risk embedded in community behavior. In LA they allowed scrub to build up, fire hydrants to run dry or not operate when electricity was shut off and …defunded the fire department.